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The article examines citizen journalism and its use by traditional mass media and online journalism outlets. The possibility of harnessing the resources of many individuals to produce journalism to supplement the reporting of traditional journalists moved from theory to practice in the 2000s. The start-up period saw many reverses, as the first attempts to make citizen journalism an ongoing enterprise met unanticipated problems with organizing and managing large numbers of volunteer participants. Two examples are provided of citizen journalism which surmounted those difficulties, a regular feature called "Get Published," which provides local news to the "Cincinnati Enquirer" newspaper, and the "Off the Bus" feature of the Web site The Huffington Post, which offered coverage of the 2008 U.S. presidential election.

The article presents information about the "Team Watchdog" of "The News-Press." After the newspaper utilized crowdsourscing to enhance reporting, Team Watchdog was formed to improve investigative reporting and further involve the community. The team focused on various topics including a database of day-care inspection reports, the use of taxes for services and time-out rooms utilized to discipline students with disabilities. It is mentioned that editors and reporters got to work well with members of Team Watchdog. Online research is also done by the team.

The article focuses on hyperlocal news Web sites created by citizens to provide information to communities and social networks whose size prevents them from being covered by traditional mass news media. The Web sites serve communities ranging in size from Dutton, Montana, population 375, to teenagers living in the Lower East Side of Manhattan in New York City. The sites examined were founded in part thanks to grants from the Knight Foundation and the University of Maryland journalism school. The organizers of the sites are surveyed, and almost all are highly positive about the experience and optimistic about the future success of the Web sites. Costs of the projects are very low, so the organizers do not rate them though conventional business metrics. Most do wish to generate enough revenue to be able to pay their contributing reporters.

A reprint of the article "Are Reporters Doomed" published in the November 12, 2007 issue of "The Guardian" is presented. It focuses on citizen journalism and the adoption of new media in journalism. It is mentioned that media companies are likely to have fewer employees in the future whose responsibility will be to process reports from freelancers, bloggers and citizen journalists. It also discussed the use of the Internet and the role of reporters.